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Sept 6th/7th, 2013 - OUR MONTHLY 4-hour ZAZENKAI! - ANGO BEGINS!

The Talk today will reflect on "Ango Now and Then" ... (text below in this thread) ...

Please 'sit-a-long' with our MONTHLY4-hourZAZENKAI, netcast LIVE8am to noon Japan time Saturday morning (that is New York 7pm to 11pm, Los Angeles 4pm to 8pm (Friday night), London midnight to 4am and Paris 1am to 5am (early Saturday morning)) ... and visible at the following link during those times ...

... to be visible at the following link during those times andany time thereafter ...

LIVE ZAZENKAI NETCAST at GOOGLE+ IS HERE:CLICK ON THE TAB ON LOWER RIGHT FOR 'FULL SCREEN

FOR THOSE NOT ALREADY MEMBERS OF THE CIRCLE WHO WISH TO JOIN TO SIT LIVE WITH A CAMERA, INSTRUCTIONS are posted AT THIS LINK. WE ARE NOW LIMITED TO 10 INDIVIDUALS WITH CAMERAS, BUT ANY NUMBER CAN WATCH LIVE 'ONE WAY' AND SIT-A-LONG VIA THE ABOVE SCREEN. IF JOINING WITH CAMERA, PLEASE MAKE SURE YOUR MICROPHONE IS MUTED:

Our Zazenkai consists of our chanting the 'Heart Sutra' and the 'Identity of Relative and Absolute (Sandokai)' in English (please download our Chant Book at the link below), some full floor prostrations (please follow along with me ... or a simple Gassho can be substituted if you wish), a little talk by me ... and we close with the 'Metta Chant', followed at the end with the 'Verse of Atonement' and 'The Four Vows'. Oh, and lots and lots of Zazen and walkin' Kinhin in between!

Please download and print out the Chants we will recite at the following link (PDF):

I STRONGLY SUGGEST THAT YOU POSITION YOUR ZAFU ON THE FLOOR IN A PLACE WHERE YOU ARE NOT STARING DIRECTLY AT THE COMPUTER SCREEN, BUT CAN GLANCE OVER AND SEE THE SCREEN WHEN NECESSARY. YOUR ZAFU SHOULD ALSO BE IN A POSITION WHERE YOU CAN SEE THE COMPUTER SCREEN WHILE STANDING IN FRONT OF THE ZAFU FOR THE CEREMONIES, AND HAVE ROOM FOR BOWING AND KINHIN.

ALSO, REMEMBER TO SET YOUR COMPUTER (& SCREEN SAVER) SO THAT IT DOES NOT SHUT OFF DURING THE 4 HOURS.

I hope you will join us ... an open Zafu is waiting. When we drop all thought of 'here' 'there' 'now' 'then' ... we are sitting all together!

Please read the following in preparation for our Zazenkai ... These Passages will be the center of today's talk ...

Ango Then and Now ...

What is Ango in our day and time, for householders in the modern West? Is it Ango as the Buddha, Dogen and all the Ancestors Practiced?

The meaning of the Japanese word Ango [安居] (Skt : varsha or varshika; Pali: vassa ) is “tranquil dwelling”. The origin is the “rainy-season retreat” , the period when Buddhist monks in India stopped their travels and outdoor activities for the duration of the rainy season and gathered at some sheltered location to devote themselves to Practice, study and discipline. One practical reason was because the heavy rainfall made traveling and outdoor activities impractical. But it was also a time when the individual monks in Buddha’s time, spending most of the year scattered here and there in small groups or individually, could gather and unite as a community and Practice together. During the rainy season in India, monks traditionally dwelt in a cave or a monastery for three months—from the sixteenth day of the fourth month to the fifteenth day of the seventh month. During this period the monks learned the Buddha's teachings, engaged in meditation and other practices, and repented their harmful behavior and weaknesses. The tradition is said to have begun during the time of Shakyamuni, was brought to China, and in Japan the three-month retreat was first observed in 683. Now it comes to us.

In the time of Master Dogen, Ango was a period of intense Practice mostly (but not exclusively) for monks living in a monastery. In his early years, Dogen’s Teachings emphasized that Zazen and Enlightenment are open to all, monks or householders, male or female, everyone. Later in life however, Dogen found himself chased out of the cosmopolitan capital city by other religious groups, turning to live in a remote and isolated monastery in the snowy mountains of Japan. Although in other writings to his lay students, Dogen continued to emphasize how this Way is open to all, his writings like Shobogenzo were meant to be talks heard primarily by his monks, meant to encourage monks in their monastic life and “keep up morale”, and thus, quite naturally, centered on the importance of Practice in a monastic setting.

But does that mean that Ango is not for householders as well? How has the Practice of Ango evolved as Zen has come to the West, to modern times, and again become open to all, monks or householders, male or female, everyone without distinction?

We will look at a few passages from Master Dogen’s “Shobogenzo-Ango”, written in his jazzy wild way:

To meet a summer retreat is to meet the buddhas and the patriarchs. To meet a summer retreat is to realize buddha and to realize the state of a patriarch. .... In this “Ninety days makes a summer,” though the measurement of time is a cerebral measurement, it is beyond only one kalpa or ten kalpas, and beyond only a hundred thousand countless kalpas. ... [The summer retreat] has not come here from another place and another time, and it does not originate from just this place and just this time. When we grasp their origins the ninety days come at once. When we grope for their basis the ninety days come at once. The common and the sacred have seen these [ninety days] as their caves and as their very lives, but [the ninety days] have far transcended the states of the common and the sacred.

** a "kalpa" is a vast eon of time measuring billions of years.
…

The World-honored One addresses Bodhisattva Round Realization, the great assemblies of monks, and all living beings:

If you practice the retreat for three months from the beginning of summer, you will abide in the pure state of a bodhisattva, your mind will leave the state of a śrāvaka, and you will be beyond dependence on others. When the day of the retreat arrives, say before the Buddha the following words: “In order that I, bhikṣu/bhikṣuṇī/upāsaka/upāsikā So-and-So, who rides upon the bodhisattva vehicle may perform tranquil practice; that I may harmoniously enter, dwell in, and maintain the pure real form; that I may make the great round realization into my temple; that body and mind may practice the retreat; and that the wisdom whose nature is balance and the peaceful natural state of self may be without hindrances; I now respectfully ask, without relying on the state of a śrāvaka, to practice the three-month retreat together with the Tathāgatas of the ten directions and the great bodhisattvas. By virtue of enacting the great causes of the supreme and fine truth of the bodhisattva, I will not be involved with others.” Good sons! This is called a bodhisattva’s manifestation of the retreat.

** a "śrāvaka" might be called a self-absorbed "armchair Buddhist"

** upāsaka/upāsikā = laymen and laywomen

...

The World-honored One practices a ninety-day retreat at one place. On the day of indulgence, Mañjuśrī suddenly appears in the order. Mahākāśyapa asks Mañjuśrī, “This summer where have you practiced the retreat?” Mañjuśrī says, “This summer I have practiced the retreat at three places.” At this, Mahākāśyapa assembles the monks. He is about to expel Mañjuśrī by striking the block, but just as he lifts the clapper he sees countless buddha lands appear. At the place of every buddha there is a Mañjuśrī, and there is a Mahākāśyapa lifting the clapper to expel Mañjuśrī. The World-honored One thereupon addresses Mahākāśyapa, “Which Mañjuśrī are you now going to expel?” Then Mahākāśyapa is dumbfounded.

...

Zen Master Engo, in a eulogy to [these ancient ancestors], says:

A big elephant does not play on a rabbit’s path.
What do swallows and sparrows know of swans and storks?
Obeying the rules is just like creating a style.
Breaking the standard is just like biting a [flying] arrow.
The whole world is Mañjuśrī.
The whole world is Mahākāśyapa.
Facing one another, each is in the solemn state.
What is there to punish by lifting the clapper?
It is a nice instance of needlework.
The golden dhūtas [who engage in hard ascetic practice] have gotten rid of [all] obstacles.

[Dogen says] So the World-honored One practices the retreat at one place and Mañjuśrī practices the retreat at three places, but neither ever fails to practice the retreat.

A festive mood is growing in our sangha and that is so very precious and so very beautiful. We/us not two. All those people all over the world, from so very different cultures and beliefs, from all walks of life, of moods and characters, drop everything and sit. Even if some of us don't yet wear a visible Okesa or Rakusu, we already do, we really do, because we are the Okesa.

If only the rest of the world could experience what we do here even for a short while. So small an event yet so infinitely big! I dream that Putin and Obama and all other big world leaders could be persuaded to join us. Partnering Putin with Obama to sit and do the exercises, would have such a profound effect on the world we live in and even the future of this world. Just imagine that! Every one of us is in fact a world leader of its own and thinking of that, this dream may not be so ridiculous. In that way the period we are embarking in is set to change the world already and for sure. Your world, my world ( not two).

Hi all,
I regret that I will not be joining you live tonight. I am at my parents' house (there is no internet - I'm at the town library) helping my Mother out following a surgical procedure. Everything is fine, my folks are in their mid-80s and need my presence right now. I will be sitting quietly tonight.

Here's to Ango and my gratitude to you all.
Deep bows
Yugen

-----------------------------------------------------------
Please take all my comments with a grain of salt - I am a novice priest and anything I say is to be taken with a good dose of skepticism - Shodo Yugen

Hi all,
I regret that I will not be joining you live tonight. I am at my parents' house (there is no internet - I'm at the town library) helping my Mother out following a surgical procedure. Everything is fine, my folks are in their mid-80s and need my presence right now. I will be sitting quietly tonight.

Here's to Ango and my gratitude to you all.
Deep bows
Yugen

Be well Yugen and will sit for you and your Mom tonight.

Gassho
Shingen

RINDO SHINGEN
倫道 真現

As a trainee priest, please take any commentary by me on matters of the Dharma with a pinch of salt.

Hi all,
I regret that I will not be joining you live tonight. I am at my parents' house (there is no internet - I'm at the town library) helping my Mother out following a surgical procedure. Everything is fine, my folks are in their mid-80s and need my presence right now. I will be sitting quietly tonight.

Here's to Ango and my gratitude to you all.
Deep bows
Yugen

You always sit with us, no matter where you are, brother.

Hope all is well.

Gassho,

Kyonin

Please remember I am only a priest in training. I could be wrong in everything I say. Slap me if needed.

The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one. Mr. Spock

Thank you everyone. It was nice to be here live the last 1.5 hours( though I couldn't figure out how to join on Google +, and didn't want to JUMP in the middle. ) Going backwards in time a wee bit now. Nice job Dosho

I was very happy to hear the schedule tossed by the wayside today, since my Internet connection often tosses it by itself: crucial cues (like bells) are sometimes lost when the stream is, so I might end up doing 40 minutes of kinhin or 70 of zazen. In this situation, inflexibility doesn't really pay...

I'm glad you are able to be with your parents tonight, Yugen. I'll keep you and your family in my thoughts as I sit tomorrow.
Thank you everyone for the sit tonight. I'm glad the mic was muted and you all couldn't hear our very upset pups who couldn't understand why they couldn't come in the room. They certainly tested my focus.
Gassho, Dan

Thank you for tonight!
I overslept the start with 45min but joined in around the first kinhin. Then it all was a sleepy mess for me. But it was really nice to practice with you all. And I'm glad I fulfilled the start for my first ANGO.

Hi from the UK. - wonderful Ango despite a head cold, internet dropping, teenage son hijacking the connection!!! But a lesson in accepting things as they are & the Ango for what it is, without preconceptions. Wonderful talk Jundo thank you & my thanks to all who sat & will sit. See you on the Ango trail!!!

May you and your parents be well Yugen. Thank you all sitters, and sorry for my dog Lara appearing on screen on the Heart Sutra...it was her first Zazenkai Goya has more experience, and Bells and Mokugyo are not new to her, so she was sleeping no problem

I had a power outage before the talk, due to the sky pouring out, so had to listen to it today, it was great....thank you all for your practice

Thank you Jundo for the wonderful talk and to all for sitting together to kick off Ango. I just concluded my first Ango sitting in my motel room at the Super 8 motel in Huntsville, Ontario - with thanks that the monastery walls are indeed much larger than the walls of this small room away from home!

Thank you for the talk Jundo. Also thank you to all those who sat and will sit. I did not sit for the whole zakenzai yet, but I watched most of it in the background as I studied to give me inspiration!